Recommendations for buying a new desktop?

[ada903]

My desktop is about 3 years old now, and it is getting really slow. It's an HP Intel Core 2 Quad 2.33 G, 8 GB, whatever that means, with Windows 7.

It is getting slow for my needs - and McAfee is giving me lots of trouble - it goes corrupt, I had to reinstall it, windows freeze, etc. I ran spybot and mcafee and don't have any viruses.

My desktop is essential for my business and I need the internet to be fast and reliable. I use it 30-40 hours a week.

Any recommendations for a high quality desktop out there? I am looking at the Apple 27 inch IMac, it has rave reviews, but I am scared to switch to an IMac. I love my Ipad and Iphone, but was never comfortable with the MacBook Air - I gave it to my daughter - it seemed so different.

Any suggestions would be appreciated!!

 

[Elan]

Generally speaking, computers don't slow down. The hardware will always be as fast as it was when it was new, and quite frankly, you have pretty decent hardware. I suggest you download Tuneup Utilities (free) and run it on your system. You might be surprised at how fast your system is afterwards.

http://download.cnet.com/TuneUp-Utilities-2012/3000-2094_4-10206416.html

 

[ada903]

Is that something you do once, or do you have to keep running it? I see it is free to try for 15 days, then you must purchase it. Thanks!

Generally speaking, computers don't slow down. The hardware will always be as fast as it was when it was new, and quite frankly, you have pretty decent hardware. I suggest you download Tuneup Utilities (free) and run it on your system. You might be surprised at how fast your system is afterwards.

http://download.cnet.com/TuneUp-Utilities-2012/3000-2094_4-10206416.html

 

[Elan]

Is that something you do once, or do you have to keep running it? I see it is free to try for 15 days, then you must purchase it. Thanks!

IIRC, the full version must be purchased, but the reduced version remains free forever. Regardless, it can be purchased for $30, which is a cheap alternative to purchasing a new system.

When I ran it on my mom's system, which had literally ground to a near halt, I ran a full clean-up once (about 45 minutes total time commitment), and then there's a one-click "maintenance" that one can run whenever they choose. It runs in the background, so it's no hassle to start it when you sit down to surf, check email, etc.

I would presume that the initial run will address most of your "slowness" issues. It certainly did for my mom's PC. Made it an order of magnitude faster.

 

[chalee94]

My desktop is about 3 years old now, and it is getting really slow. It's an HP Intel Core 2 Quad 2.33 G, 8 GB, whatever that means...

it means some of your software is slowing you down.

i'd agree with the other poster: you probably don't need a new machine.

if you have the comfort level and know what you are doing, i'd reinstall windows. (and be careful with using utilities like norton or mcafee...they are often the culprits when your machine slows down.)

but a good tune-up software is worth a shot if you are not sure about reinstalling software and such...

 

[ace2000]

My desktop is about 3 years old now, and it is getting really slow. It's an HP Intel Core 2 Quad 2.33 G, 8 GB, whatever that means, with Windows 7.

It is getting slow for my needs - and McAfee is giving me lots of trouble - it goes corrupt, I had to reinstall it, windows freeze, etc. I ran spybot and mcafee and don't have any viruses.

My desktop is essential for my business and I need the internet to be fast and reliable. I use it 30-40 hours a week.

Any recommendations for a high quality desktop out there? I am looking at the Apple 27 inch IMac, it has rave reviews, but I am scared to switch to an IMac. I love my Ipad and Iphone, but was never comfortable with the MacBook Air - I gave it to my daughter - it seemed so different.

Any suggestions would be appreciated!!

There was a thread recently about the Mac vs. PC, so I'm not going to get into that debate. Based on the specs you provided, you still have a pretty decent machine. I'm not sure what you use it for, but it should be fine for Internet surfing and word processing.

If you (or anyone else) are interested in purchasing a new PC, watch woot.com for a deal on a computer. They frequently have great deals on PC's.

 

[Chrisky]

You can also purchase a refurbished Mac directly from Apple with the same warranties as a new one, at a better price.

 

[malonem68]

As one that works on computers daily I agree you don't need a new machine. The easiest way to have your machine run like new is to do a fresh install of Windows.

Just be sure to back up all of your important files prior to the install. The easiest way to do this is to get an external hard drive and copy all of the files over to that drive. Then, after you do a fresh install, just pull them back onto your desktop.

Tip for everyone out there. When I am working on someones computer, many times they have files saved all over the place. ALWAYS save all of your documents, pictures, music, tax returns, etc. someplace in the 'My Documents' folder. This makes it very easy to just copy the entire my documents folder to another drive, do the fresh install, and copy the my documents folder back.

The only downside to the fresh install is you will need to reinstall any software you have loaded.


**For the more advanced users- Set up a second hard drive or external hard drive. Save all of your documents/music, etc. to that second drive. Ghost your machine frequently and you can just ghost the image back when it starts slowing down.

 

[geekette]

Ditch McAfee, stay away from Norton. Both are notorious hogs.

I've been using Avast free version and it's not got the invasiveness the others do.

Assuming you install Windows fresh, pick something other than McAfee. It's going to slow things down and you'll be right back in the same situation.

A wonderful perk of going thru the laborious fresh os install is that you get to leave behind all the OEM crap and get just what you want, just what you will use.

It is a better solution than buying new as I agree you don't need to replace, just need to clean up.

 

[ronparise]

Im not a computer tech like malonem68...but Ive been following his advice for years.. Im using a 10 year old machine, When Windows XP came out I installed it (over windows ME) and every year or two I wipe the harddrive (or buy a new one) and re install windows XP. Its getting easier every year as more and more of my files are in the cloud...very little on my machine...

The hardware lasts or can be easily replaced Its the software that gets corrupted

 

[hypnotiq]

My desktop is about 3 years old now, and it is getting really slow. It's an HP Intel Core 2 Quad 2.33 G, 8 GB, whatever that means, with Windows 7.

You're even remotely close to needing a new computer. That machine is more than powerful to run Win7 (and Win8).

People run into problems with the speed of their computer because of the programs that they've installed (or that came pre-installed from some OEM's :annoyed. Another source of issues, is every peripheral out there these days (printers, webcams, etc) no longer just install the driver that Windows needs to use the device. They have to install their own "software center" because they want a branded experience to the user. This contributes to the bloat/slowing down the computer. Every new computer I buy, I immediately wipe and put a 'clean' version of Windows on. My home development machine has had the same install of Windows 7 I put on there right after we released it and I havent had to reinstall it once.

McAfee/Norton are huge contributors to this. I don't personally run AV software but on my families computers, I set them all up with Webroot, which, IMO has not caused significant performance degradation.

If you have someone that can help you, your best bet is to backup your data and wipe the computer and start fresh. #1, you'll get rid of all the OEM bloatware. #2, you can be more careful about what you install going forward.

Try and stay away from installing crappy shareware/freeware programs out there that people tend to install all the time.

Also, as someone else stated, if you have someone wipe the system, have them setup multiple partitions. A primary partition for your OS install/programs and a secondary partition for all your data. This is good for two reasons. #1, if something ever happens to your primary OS, you can easily reinstall without worrying about your data and #2, it puts everything in an easy to remember spot. Based on your system description, I'm guessing your harddrive is anywhere between 500GB-1TB, so you'll have plenty of drive space for the second partition.

Also, you can easily "redirect" all your folders to save/view files from the secondary partition.

You do this by doing the following (Windows 7)

• Click Start
• Click on your Username in the top right part of the start menu
• Right click each folder in the window that opens up and select Properties
• Click the Location Tab
• Click the Move button
• Navigate to your second partition and create a folder with the same name (i.e. Contacts) and click Select Folder
• Click OK
• It will ask you to confirm you want to move your items from old location to the new location, click Yes
• Repeat this for every folder.

Windows will now go to the new location, automagically when you click on the known folders like Documents/Pictures/etc.

-Nico

 

[ada903]

Excellent advice, thanks all! I did download the tuneup software, and ran it, and now I am considering reinstalling windows. I do believe mcafee is the culprit to a large extent, and we will look into alternatives!

 

[hypnotiq]

Honestly, reinstalling Windows is probably your best route, especially since you'll be able to drop all the OEM bloatware.

As I said in my earlier post, if you need to run AV software, I have found Webroot to be the most lightweight of the AV software out there while still effective..

 

[Ken555]

Keep your PC, just maintain it properly. As for anti virus, we've had excellent success with Vipre over the last year (we are migrating many, many computers from Symantec and others now). WebRoot had some good products but when we last evaluated them we weren't as happy. Of course, YMMV.

 

[Kal]

How much memory is in the machine? Not enuf memory could cause significant slowing of the system. With Win7 it would be nice if you had 4-6 GB of RAM. If you need more, the chips are cheap and easy to install.

 

[hypnotiq]

How much memory is in the machine? Not enuf memory could cause significant slowing of the system. With Win7 it would be nice if you had 4-6 GB of RAM. If you need more, the chips are cheap and easy to install.

They said it was a quad core w/8GB of RAM, that thing is plenty powerful.

 

[hypnotiq]

Thanks Ken. Ill have to look into Vipre. I haven't looked in a couple years, so back then Webroot was the best. Like I said, I don't run AV s/w on my computers, so I only research it when I have to fix family/friends computers.

They seem to think my working at Microsoft entitles to them to lifetime computer support.

 

[Ken555]

Thanks Ken. Ill have to look into Vipre. I haven't looked in a couple years, so back then Webroot was the best. Like I said, I don't run AV s/w on my computers, so I only research it when I have to fix family/friends computers.

They seem to think my working at Microsoft entitles to them to lifetime computer support.

You work at MS yet don't have AV on your systems? Err... Really? Or are you using the MS AV?

 

[hypnotiq]

You work at MS yet don't have AV on your systems? Err... Really? Or are you using the MS AV?

Our corporate systems have AV software on them but no, none of my personal computers/laptops/slates have AV software on them. I also know better when it comes to "how not to catch a virus.

My dad on the other hand is always clicking on *bleep* he shouldn't be, so I had to become familiar with AV software. LOL

 

[Ken555]

Our corporate systems have AV software on them but no, none of my personal computers/laptops/slates have AV software on them. I also know better when it comes to "how not to catch a virus.

Well, that really is the best solution. My personal Windows system has never been infected (and you know what will happen today now that I've posted this) but with all the time and energy we spend fixing this problem everywhere I do have AV installed. We also use a redundant AV for incoming email (at our anti spam cloud based service and at our mail server) to attempt to prevent that source of problems, too.

Unfortunately, many virus infections are a result of users not knowing that they shouldn't just click on everything...